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Thoughts on Miamiís 16-6 loss at home to Atlanta

The Miami Dolphins suffered an ugly loss to the Atlanta Falcons last night, and the only feeling and thoughts that went through my head were that of complete disgust and embarrassment. The whole first team failed to move the ball the whole first half, or make anything happen on either offense or defense to suggest that the starting units as a whole made strides from last year. They were completely dominated, plain and simple. The Falcons were the better team, and despite the score, 16-6 suggesting otherwise, this game was not that close, and could have been a lot worse if Falcons quarterback Matt Ryan was more accurate last night. But even though I am disappointed, I do have some quick thoughts to share before I watch the replay on my DVR.

Vontae Davis was the lone bright spot on the team last night. He registered 7 tackles, one forced fumble, and three pass deflections on the night, and he did not even play the full game! Davis made his presence felt in both the run and pass defense. He was in single coverage most of the night, against Roddy White, and dominated. Granted, there were some plays where White or one of the other Falcons receivers broke loose, or caught a pass in front of Davis, but with Davis being on an island, you have to take the rare mishaps with the multiple highlights and plays he gave the Fins defense last night. Davis was described by some members of the media as one of the most improved payers on the team this year, and he showed why he has garnered that praise last night.

The Dolphins are committing way too many penalties right now in the pre-season. Yes, this is the pre-season, and the team has yet to form that chemistry within the whole offense or defense. But the team is committing stupid penalties that just come down to mental mistake, which is the one thing that this coaching staff will not tolerate. If this continues during the season, one has to question the coaching staff and why these mental mistakes keep happening.

The ground game was nothing last night. In fact, this is the third straight game where our rushing attack was invisible. Our team is built around the run. All of the players on the starting offensive squad are reknowned for their run blocking, or their mean streak. So you can see my concern when our one main strength has not been effective during the pre-season. The biggest gains on the ground last night for the Fins came out of the Wildcat, something that I thought we would not need to use as much with our run offense being so reliable without it.

I didn't want to have a undefeated pre-season either. But the Falcon game was like a cold slap in the face kind of wakeup call. The time is now for the offensive line to gell as a unit and the entire team to raise their intensity and start playing at a higher level to be successfull this season. Taking nothing away from the Falcons they showed some young new players how high the bar is raised. But with all Dolphin's talent and youth there is plenty of reasons for optimism.

i for one am not to worried about our offense or defense as of right now, because we are just using basic vanilla offense and defense, not giving the regular season teams to much to scout for and gameplan around, not worried about the running game, they dont wont to risk injuries to ronnie or ricky, the only 2 things i am worried about are the penalties and the drops but those can be fixed

-Vontae was a borderline pro-bowler.
- Misi was outstanding 90% of the time. Made a couple mistakes not setting the edge but was very impressive otherwise. Showed power, discipline, and grit. He will make way more plays than mistakes this year.
- John Jerry was solid 90% of the time. Very impressive for a rookie not only run blocking but pass blocking was really solid. A few break-downs prevented perfection.
-Incognito, outstanding both run and passpro. He improved his game this off-season. Had the most pancakes in the game. The best OLineman tonight. (Long and Carey go without saying. Long "Dominated" 99.9% of the time and was unusually brutal at times. Carey was decent enough.)

Honorable mention in order:

-Dansby/Dobbins, solid in coverage for the most part. Kept one of the best TE's in the game in check. Dansby needs work on blitzing, too hesitant. Run D was pretty good but it's obvious Dansby is still figuring out how to shoot gaps as a 34 backer. Hesitant or took bad gaps/angles at times.
-Randy Starks....I only put him here cause everyone knows he's a baller so we expect him to play well. He was disruptive and instinctive.
-Alama-Francis was very stout at the point. Made some good plays and set the edge well. Had one play where he showed a great club move and was just a fraction of a second from making a sack.
-Marshall...like Starks, we expect him to perform well. Made some clutch catches and blocked well. Unfortunately, our QB's couldn't get him the ball more.
-Moore/Wallace, it's going to be a tough call between these two. I'd take both of them over Turner.

Disappointing in order:

-Jared Odrick, I'll be surprised if he starts the season. Terrible! No penetration, was thinking WAY too much! Gave up on plays. Did not make one play.
-Chad Henne, IMO he was the biggest reason we didn't move the ball against the 1's. Played scared rushing his throws, pocket awareness was poor, and throwing to covered receivers when others were open. Could've run on a couple of plays but chose to force throws that weren't there. Poor decisions in general. Did not recognize blitzes properly. Throws were off. Piss-poor performance. He needs to relax and trust his linemen.

Other mentionable:

-Dan Henning, granted it's pre-season, but given the schemes ATL was running against our offense (surprisingly, quite a few blitzes)....he didn't adjust very well. I'll give him a pass though since it's preseason.

How did they keep coming in on Henne right up the middle?? Seemed like alot.
Had to watch on the Internet & didn't get a good look why.

Most of the pressure was from the outside, usually blitzes. I only saw one maybe two inside pressures on Henne. He really was not pressured that much, just rushed the throws. He could've waited a second or two longer on quite a few of those plays. Or just ran with it. Honestly, the line did not play all that bad.

Correction to original assessment of Jerry - Take away about 2-3 plays (notably first play of the game) and he looked rock solid.

And another notable.....Micah Johnson, showed good instincts and power. If we keep 4 ILB's, Micah will be the forth.